The OrangeEyed Children in Sublevel A
by Dark Mirage1
Summary: The married, young father Mason Eckhart discovers the existence of Genomex mutants in 1987.


1987  
  
Everyone knew that more went on at Genomex than the research tastefully   
  
photographed for the company's glossy annual report. Everyone knew that   
  
Genomex had sections devoted to government-sponsored black projects,   
  
operating much like Kelly Johnson's Skunk Works at Lockheed.  
  
Like most people, I assumed the Genomex black projects involved plants and   
  
domestic animals. I even socialized with one of the prime researchers and   
  
still didn't know any better about what was really going on.  
  
Black projects are necessary. I have no ethical qualms about funding such   
  
operations with well-hidden dollars, not when they yield technology like the   
  
SR-71 and F117-A. However, those projects had honorable motivations   
  
driving them.  
  
I should have quit the day I first saw the orange-eyed children, quit the   
  
same way my predecessor did five months into the job.  
  
With my promotion came an upgraded keycard that opened 73 % of   
  
Genomex's doors instead of my former access to 38%. I could not have   
  
imagined the things I found behind those doors, not in my darkest   
  
nightmares: children who could walk through walls; children who could   
  
make themselves invisible; children who knew what I was thinking, and   
  
children clambering to the top of bookshelves, peering down like cats,   
  
flashing temporarily orange eyes at me.  
  
They were ordinary enough looking human children, but they were different,   
  
and they knew it.  
  
I went directly to Adam's office, expecting an explanation I could stomach.   
  
Adam was a geneticist, Dr Paul Breedlove's protégé, and a frequent visitor to   
  
my home. He didn't have any other friends I knew about, since all he   
  
seemed to do was work and spend Saturday evenings with Jackie and me.  
  
"Adam, I've seen the children in Sublevel A. What is going on down there?"   
  
We'd known each other since I'd started with the company, so I felt free to   
  
be blunt with him.   
  
"Well, as I've told you, Genomex and allied clinics of the Breedlove   
  
Foundation specialize in dealing with difficult conceptions...we repair genetic   
  
flaws that ordinarily would result in spontaneous abortions, and once those   
  
repairs are completed, we return the embryos to complete gestation. We've   
  
enjoyed a remarkable success rate of live, healthy births."   
  
  
  
Adam smiled throughout, pleased with himself, pleased with his work.   
  
"But Adam, there was something odd about all of the children I saw. Some   
  
of them seemed human but more than human, especially the ones with the   
  
orange eyes, climbing like cats in trees."   
  
"The ones you saw represent exceptional cases, cases where the repair went   
  
subtly wrong and the result was...unexpected." He still smiled.  
  
"But so many of them, and to have the expressed anomalies crop up in   
  
similar patterns! Do we have some kind of rehabilitation program to fix   
  
these unfortunate children?"  
  
"They're here because they live here. Their parents either couldn't cope with   
  
their behavior or conduct, or they found them so unpresentable they signed   
  
custody over to Genomex."  
  
I could not decide if Adam was smiling because he was a deluded true   
  
believer or if he had grossly underestimated my intellect and character.   
  
Perhaps all three factors were operating.  
  
"They are human children, Adam! They are not criminals. What is Genomex   
  
doing keeping them down there in Sublevel A, away from society, out of   
  
sight of the sun?"  
  
I knew the answer as soon as I asked the question. We're hiding our   
  
mistakes.  
  
"Mason, that sounds harsh."  
  
"They're people, like you and me. What's to become of them when they're   
  
adults?"  
  
"Breedlove in fact created the first mutants nearly twenty years ago. There   
  
are older individuals in Sublevels B and C.   
  
"What really goes on at this place?"  
  
"Genetic research to cure -permanently, by effecting changes in the base-  
  
pair coding-- hideous genetic diseases."  
  
"And what else, Adam?"   
  
"That's it, Mason. I'm proud of the work I do here, and proud of all the lives   
  
I've saved."  
  
  
  
"Are you very sure of that? Shortly after Jackie conceived Grey, we received   
  
a letter from Genomex inviting us to free genetic screening. The timing was   
  
extraordinary. Only her doctor, her family, and you knew about the   
  
pregnancy."  
  
"Oh, I added your names to a mailing list but surely you don't see anything   
  
sinister in that?"  
  
He was still smiling. I didn't know what to think.  
  
My gut instinct was that Adam, along with a number of other Genomex   
  
researchers and managers, was lying to me about the nature and scope of   
  
the company. If ever the time to leave Genomex this was now that time.   
  
Leave before Grey started school. Leave before the public discovered the   
  
unholy secrets behind the walls and down a few levels in the ground, and   
  
association with Genomex became career-killing resume poison.   
  
I resolved to tell Jackie that evening that I wanted to leave Genomex. I   
  
couldn't tell her why, because of secrecy agreements I had signed upon   
  
employment. I'd just have to be emphatic.  
  
After lunch, Breedlove summoned me to his office. I had not sinned. I have   
  
always been almost annoyingly reliable and dependable, so I wasn't worried.   
  
But the timing was obvious: the meeting had everything to do with my   
  
morning chat with Adam.  
  
"Mr Eckhart, it came to my attention that your compensation was not   
  
appropriately increased when your recent promotion went into effect."   
  
In fact, my pay had increased. What was he talking about?  
  
"I've personally seen to it that your pay will not only be increased to proper   
  
levels, as indicated on that piece of paper," he said, pausing to lean across   
  
his desk and hand me a slip of paper indicating an astonishing monthly   
  
salary, "but we'll also write a check to make that increase retroactive through   
  
last month."  
  
Paul Breedlove smiled at me. Breedlove and Adam must take smiling lessons   
  
from the same con artist. Neither is particularly convincing.   
  
"Well, thank you, Dr Breedlove. This is unexpected." I wasn't expecting a   
  
bribe, which is exactly what this was.  
  
I never had a chance to discuss leaving Genomex with Jackie. Before I   
  
reached the door, Jackie was outside, happily telling me her pregnancy was   
  
not only confirmed, but that she was carrying twins.  
  
  
  
I knew I would never come close to matching the pay level Breedlove was   
  
bribing me with, not at my age and experience level. So, I mentally put off   
  
leaving Genomex a few years, to 1992-1994.  
  
That Saturday, Adam came by for dinner, played with Grey, and   
  
congratulated us on the coming twins.  
  
We sat down to a casual dinner. Even as Jackie prattled on to Adam about   
  
how we were now going to have to find a bigger house, I remained distracted   
  
and haunted by the children with the orange eyes down in the pits of   
  
Genomex, wondering if I wasn't making a mistake in judgment that would   
  
haunt me even more. Jackie passed around the grilled burgers. 


End file.
